


Cut You Down

by drinkbloodlikewine



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: M/M, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-08
Updated: 2014-04-08
Packaged: 2018-01-18 14:32:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 744
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1431994
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/drinkbloodlikewine/pseuds/drinkbloodlikewine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Matthew and Will flee Baltimore; mistakes are made (vaguely AU)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Cut You Down

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kyrilu](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kyrilu/gifts).



Wrong place, wrong time, wrong life.

The officer hadn’t meant for his night to end up like this anymore than they had. It wasn’t in the cards, wasn’t part of the plans, but his blood poured out black over the tile all the same and Will Graham stood shaking in the sightless gaze of the man he’d just killed and any god above that turned an eye on him.

It wasn’t supposed to be like this. He was one of the good ones. He stopped people who did bad things.

He was supposed to stop people who did things like this.

“Keys!”

The voice called to him like a boat horn through dense bayou fog and the world was bathed in the blood of his wrongs, lenses splattered scarlet.

“Get the fucking keys!”

The bottle broke when it hit the ground, like it hadn’t broken against the officer’s temple. It didn’t work like in the movies, bottle bursting in a spray of bourbon and glittering glass and the bad guy just crumpling neatly to the ground with a headache pending his awakening a short time later.

Instead there was a crack like a branch snapping and so much blood, blood everywhere, blood still gurgling over the floor from the bad guy who wasn’t one, whose badge shone polished bright in the flickering liquor store lights and who had a wedding ring on his hand and who had tried to talk them both down when he realized who he had found.

“I didn’t mean to -”

“Goddammit,” hissed Matthew, pushing himself off the counter where he had been cuffed. “Not now. We can’t do this now. Get the keys. Listen to me. Do you hear me? Listen, get the keys. We gotta go. We gotta go now or it’s all for nothing.”

A stiff nod, breath heaving past his dry lips as Will gingerly reached down to the prone form beneath him, loosening the keys from his belt. He nearly dropped them, fingers numb, and Matthew bit his lip to stop himself from yelling, exhaling hard as the cuffs clattered to the floor. He grabbed the bag of groceries from the counter with one hand and grabbed Will’s wrist with the other and pulled him over the body and through the blood and out into the night.

“I couldn’t let him - he was going to -” Will gasped, panic tightening like straitjacket straps cracking his ribs and crushing the air out of his lungs. He tripped as he was tugged along and Matthew yanked him closer.

Matthew pushed Will into the passenger side and threw the groceries in the back of the hotwired car that had drawn the passing patrolman’s attention in the first place. “We’re gonna have to lose this thing.”

“I killed him.”

He looked sidelong at Will, who pushed the door back open and vomited violently into the parking lot gravel. He could see the clerk emerging from behind the counter, phone against his ear, and he reached across Will to pull the door shut again, peeling out of the lot.

“I killed that man,” Will said, voice rattling as bad as his body.

“Sure did,” responded Matthew as he sped onto the highway. The yellow lines of the road blended into a golden blur in the headlights, becoming a solid line beneath the front of the car. He looked again at Will trembling beside him, blood still cast across his face like some pagan baptism gone wrong.

Or right.

“Hey,” Matthew said, voice softening as he slid a hand over onto Will’s thigh, seeking out his hand, their fingers tangling. “Hey. It’ll be okay. Shit happens. It’ll be okay, I promise.”

Will tried to pull his hand away but Matthew wouldn’t let him, held him fast instead. A thunderous silence filled the car until Will finally spoke, face pressed against the cool glass window.

“I couldn’t let them take us back.”

“You could’ve run.”

“I couldn’t let them take you back.”

"I’d be fine."

"I wouldn’t."

The words filled the air like stormclouds, and Matthew brought Will’s hand to his lips, tasted whiskey warmth and cold blood on his fingers.

"It’s what you did for me," Will said quietly. 

Matthew leaned nearer him, kissed hotly against Will’s neck, following his racing pulse, murmuring words of stark devotion as Will kept his eyes on the road ahead, increasingly uncertain of their destination but willing to ensure that nothing would turn them off their path.


End file.
